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The Dig­i­tal Couch took a well-deserved rest after Christ­mas but now it’s up and rar­ing to go again – revived after its mini-break to Paris. It did find love with a sofa in the Lou­vre but alas there was no Valen­tine card in the post. Worry not; we’ve man­aged to stop him brood­ing just long enough to take a look at what’s been hap­pen­ing in the world of tech so far this year.

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The Lion, the Switch and the Wardrobe.

Every year, the cream-of-the-global-ad-agency crop head to sunny Cannes for the Cannes Lions Fes­ti­val of Cre­ativ­ity. Often thought of as the ulti­mate in cam­paign kudos, the Grand Prix award is a cov­eted tro­phy in adver­tis­ing excel­lence. Here are some of my favourite win­ners from last week’s event.

Write the Future – Wieden Kennedy for Nike

What hap­pens when you have unlim­ited funds and access to pretty much every major sports star in the world? This out­stand­ing World Cup cam­paign walked away with the Film Grand Prix 2011. (W+K took the lion’s share with 6 Gold awards in total.)

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After the spring hia­tus, the Dig­i­tal Couch is back for another sea­son of enter­tain­ment. We haven’t been can­celled… yet.

This week we look at the fine line that sep­a­rates us from our dig­i­tal selves. Think about it. There are, in fact, 2 of you. One has a job, shops at the local super­mar­ket and waits for the bus. Then there’s the other you; the one who runs ram­pant across the inter­net, wreak­ing havoc and leav­ing a greasy dig­i­tal foot­print every­where you go.

So what hap­pens when some­thing from your dig­i­tal world crosses over into the world of bus queues and super­mar­kets? Here is a selec­tion of cam­paigns that do just that.

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This week we pay homage to trans­port. From the old, the bril­liant and new, and the ‘I don’t get it?’, we bring you cam­paigns, con­cepts and chaos that emerge when you mix horse­power and creativity.

Tech vs. Car (Again)

A few weeks ago we looked at a mobile broad­band com­pany who wanted to see if their con­nec­tion was faster than an F1 car. It seems tech­nol­ogy and rac­ing are still inex­tri­ca­bly linked.

Epson decided it would be a great idea to see if their lat­est printer was faster than a race car. Why? Um… I’m not quite sure. Use­ful the next time you are on the track and need that pre­sen­ta­tion ASAP I guess.

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This week I revisit some ren­di­tions of ear­lier posts, reveal that I’m a bit of a sci-fi fan­boy, look at how splash­ing some paint on the walls and a hand­ful of cam­eras can cre­ate some engag­ing cam­paign ideas, and also at what hap­pens when you dis­tract UK dri­vers with mon­ster cleav­age. Enjoy.

Last week, we looked at herd­ing cats in IKEA. Not strictly a cam­paign, but this video is a great par­ody of the orig­i­nal.

Next, an homage to Halo. As some of you may know, Bungie Stu­dios launched the new Halo Reach game for the X-Box con­sole at mid­night on Tues­day with excited fans queu­ing for over 2 days to get their hands on a copy.

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So, games pub­lisher, Pop­cap, found a gold­mine in the gar­den. Plants vs. Zom­bies, which started as a PC game has become some­thing more. Diver­si­fy­ing its plat­form base and rack­ing up huge sup­port in App Stores, users can ‘try before they buy’ with some great online executions.

What do you do when your com­pany causes the world’s most media-tracked nat­ural dis­as­ter? Isn’t it obvi­ous? You blow 3.5 mil­lion dol­lars on Google ads, that’s what…

How do you know when viral danc­ing (a ‘la flash­mob style) is finally dead? When com­pa­nies have to resort to the cute­ness of chil­dren to make them work; that’s when. Fol­low­ers, be ashamed…

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Every week, Ban­ner brings you more cool campaigns/ideas/articles found whilst sniff­ing round the inter­web.


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• Don’t Shoot the Bear! – YouTube made inter­est­ing by Tipp-Ex. Great cam­paign for dri­ving user input. Be cre­ative with your ideas. Try: fishes, dances, rap, tick­les, picks up, shoots and eats to get you going… (It will all make sense when you are there, trust me.)
• Another YouTube cre­ation, this time with Sly and some friends…
• If you missed the Apple spe­cial announce­ment yes­ter­day, then you won’t want to miss this. Finally, a place where Apple “fan­boys” can go and com­mu­ni­cate with the like-minded.

From using Twit­ter as a social paint­brush, to tar­get­ing the under­dogs of great­ness, here are some of the best campaigns/virals/ideas/social media dri­vers we’ve found down the back of the dig­i­tal couch in the last week:

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• Can Cha­troulette actu­ally be used for some­thing use­ful? One agency thought so. Does it go too far? You be the judge.
• Twit­ter becomes a social paint­brush to con­vince Amer­ica that Canada is great!
• What hap­pens when you mix glit­tery vam­pires and prod­uct place­ment with a social media strat­egy? Great idea or cringe wor­thy cash-in?